Time Can't Always Be Rewritten
by bowtiesandredhair
Summary: Set after 2011 Christmas Pond reunion. The Doctor returns once again to his Ponds, yet is surprised when they're not-so glad to see him back.  M-Rated for future chapters, just in case.
1. Innocent Traveler

The thrumming of the TARDIS, the rush of leaves through the air, even the feeling in her skin was familiar. Amy Pond sat lazily in her large, yellow (rather ugly) chair, balancing a thick book between her trembling hands. It was a cold March 1st, though whenever her husband was away at work, she threw all of the windows open and let the crisp breeze run through the house like blood through its veins.

Her eyelids lightly fluttered at the sound, and immediately, her face held still and the cold finally brought the suppressed bitterness to her skin. _No, it wasn't him. _She repeated as many times as the wind gently brushed against the defiant pages of her book. The leaves danced violently outside, yet she closed her eyes in a futile attempt to pretend that a decent amount hadn't already raced through the windows and onto the hardwood floor. They quietly skid across to her, and she looked to them, this time, with a shroud of sadness. _What if it wasn't __him__? _She swallowed dryly at the thought. The crunching of footsteps, coupled with the creaking shut of a wooden door, and her denial faded all the more with the gentle knock at the front door.

Amy slowly lowered her head into the book as the knocking persisted, and she sighed. Her legs dragged out from the mouth-like chair and she placed the book on the small table where a picture of her and Rory sat. She caught her reflection in the glass, and she paused, watching the breeze gently sifted through her short, red hair. For a moment, she found herself thoughtlessly staring, slowly bringing her hands to touch her shoulders. Her thoughts replayed the illusion of the long locks of hair that had once lazily sprawled across them, and for once in a long while, she replayed the day she cut it all off.

His quiet knock had become a worried pound, and his voice called through the wood as she approached the door. It _was _him. But was it? She quickly tied her hair back into somewhat of a mess, yet when her hand reached for the rattling doorknob, she paused again. With a single move, she reached into the pocket of her baggy sweater, and pulled out a pair of dark glasses. She found herself somewhat smiling at them as she fit them past her ears, and when her hand drifted for the doorknob, she was surprised not to see it trembling.

She felt her consciousness skip a beat as her hand lunged for the doorknob, stopping before _that _Amy desperately tore the door open to see _her _Doctor. For a moment, she tried to concentrate on breathing, to calm herself, using an exercise she was taught at her therapy session. She inhaled slowly, concentrating on the way her lungs seemed to fill themselves, and she released, concentrating on how the air effortlessly escaped. She leaned forward to see through the peephole of the door, and silently gasped as she saw his face, his head inflated from the curved glass, beaming as he stood there on the doorstep. It was him. But was it?

"I hear you breathing on the other side, Pond!" He said with an excited tone, and she watched as he anxiously bopped up and down in place, his hands folded in front of him.

She brought her fingers up to the lock, as the dual voices shouted in her mind, the echoing sound of it clicking free, and the possessed feeling as she turned the doorknob. Was it _that _Amy again?

The door slowly creaked its way open, the wind assisting, and she immediately leaned against the wall, staring at him behind her dark glasses. He stood there, with a stupid, wide smile on his face, as if he had just won a prestigious award and came running to tell her about it in person, excited for her excitement, anxious for her to throw herself onto him and hug him as tight as possible. Yet as she stood in the shadows, what had been playing in his mind for so long, suddenly dwindled to her unemotional silence.

He nervously nodded to himself, quickly glancing down as his mouth had some sort of spasm, and he glanced up, his wide smile returning. "Hello."

She watches as his excitement slowly dwindled, and yet his face seemed only to fade and be replaced with an endearing expression. He looked at her, and somewhat felt even more anxious as he couldn't connect with her eyes, until finally succumbing to the wave of self-loathing and he tilted to hang his head.

"I don't know how long-" By his tone, it was evident he was tearing himself up inside of his head, and slowly his eyes drifted up to her, "But I needed to see you." Another internal slap at his idiocy. "I w-wanted to see you, I mean." He released a short, nervous laugh, and it spread into a sweet smile. "H-How are you? How's Rory?"

Yet still, she remained silent. The only sign she was actually alive was her quiet breathing and her eyelids lightly fluttering beneath the black lenses.

Suddenly, his concern overtook him, "Amy?" and she felt his sweet, attentive whisper cut through her skin.

Amy carefully blinked away the boiling tears, and she swallowed dryly in attempt to swallow the uprising feelings. "Good to see you, Doctor." Her voice was quiet. "Though I'm afraid I have to go. Rory's in the kitchen and he-"

The excited smile spread at the sound of normalcy, "Rory the Roman!" His voice burst cheerfully, and he resumed bobbing anxiously up and down. "Mind if I come in for a mo?" His eyes drifted past her, and then returned to her face, forcing his smile past the suffocating silence.

Without another word, he slowly moved towards the doorway, and she immediately flinched back from him. He watched as her body language stiffened in defense and he looked at her with a confused expression.

"Amy, what's wrong?"

His tone continued to cut through her, yet she shook her head, and glanced up at him as coldly as she could force herself.

"Doctor, we're in the middle of something important..." She uttered quickly, moving her arm to pull the door shut, but before she could glance up, he had slid his foot in the door, and slipped through.

"Amy, what's happened?"

Her eyes finally registered his face being inches from hers, and she shivered at the feeling of his words on her skin.

"Tell me." He whispered, gently running his hand into hers, and she felt her skin burn at his touch.

Yet almost immediately, she choked back that Amy as he moved to hold her, and quickly slid back down the wall away from him, throwing her arms up at him as he followed.

"Doctor, _please_." She quietly, breathlessly pleaded, and his concern was validated.

With a single nod and a self-deprecating glance, he moved back out the door.

"I'm sorry." He said, and the sincerity in his tone killed her. How she just wanted to-No. She choked away that Amy from even picturing it.

The Doctor looked up at her as he blindly slipped his foot on the step outside the door, and he forced himself to muster a smile, yet it was faint and quickly lost in his sadness. He stepped down, trying not to watch her, and he opened his mouth to speak, yet stood silent as the door the creaked shut. With the quiet scraping of his shoes against concrete, he turned to his TARDIS and stared.


	2. Why?

Amy slowly slid from under her feet as she leaned weakly against the front door. She listened to the sound of his receding footsteps, and her mind strictly played that day to keep that Amy inside, to keep herself from tearing it back open and running to him, to keep those emotions that stirred from even his sad-sounding walk. She had had the argument in her head for as long as she could remember. But it wasn't _him_. Her Doctor was still there, and he was leaving too quickly, though he always was, but this time it was her fault. She shunned him away, and for what?

"It's not him." She quietly murmured to herself, sliding down completely, and she stretched her legs as she sat, feeling the dull pain that came every time she attempted to relax.

She closed her eyes to picture her mind, and it stood in front of her, arms crossed, unimpressed with her claim. Only logic swayed it, and for the situation, she had none. It was all emotional.

"But at least," she felt each small breath band together in strength until the thought sifted through her lips, "He's all right."

The thrumming sound of the TARDIS danced through the breeze, and she waited until she heard the leaves frantically scatter back to the grass. Slowly, and with a quiet groan, she pulled herself up, and wobbled as she made her way down the hallway.

Amy yawned, plopping back down in her hideous, yellow chair, and she ignored the pain as she reached for her book. He watched her groan and she gently pressed her hand into her side, oblivious to his eyes never leaving her tired face.

From the moment he stepped into his TARDIS, he had been watching her, and he disregarded how it would appear to anyone, like he was some sort of stalker or creeper. No. He shook the thoughts away. It wasn't wrong. She was his. She was always his. _His _Amelia Pond. _His _little Scottish girl. _His _sweet, fiery ginger. And it never not occurred to him that something was horribly wrong, the scanner was just a way to verify an intellectual hypothesis. Strictly a means of ensuring he was right. He loved being right. The Doctor always knew everything and he raced like a madman trying to keep that. This was simply….logical.

He watched her as she paused to stare blankly down at the plain-looking book, and her tilted head revealed the cut mess of hair that was tied back from her face. Boy, was it cut, almost mangled to his eyes, and from the way the ends rested rather fresh, he deduced that she kept it that length, snipping it away whenever it slightly grew out.

Thoughtlessly, he watched her. Losing count of the pages she lazily scanned and flipped through. That itch in his head, the one that inevitably saw everything, his curse, it whispered like a dark voice in his ear. By the look on her face, the bothered and distracted, yet somewhat calm and longing look, he felt conceited to think that she was thinking of him.

Her eyes drifted into a blank stare at the open emptiness of the silent house, and she found herself replaying the moment as slowly and quietly as she possibly could.

"An apple is still an apple." She thought to herself, "No matter if it's green or red. It's still an apple. Perhaps—"

Immediately, she felt a dull sting on the side of her cheek, and her face sunk back in her book. She felt her mind and logic tighten around that innocent thought.

"_No_." they said forcefully, and they pulled her up from the chair and guided her to walk down the hallway. "_Must we remind you again of your scars?"_

He watched as she slipped past the bathroom door and the bright light flickered on, and she stood, staring at her reflection. With her left eye, she focused on each feature, hesitantly pulling away the dark, circular lenses from her nose.

Her face was worn and sad, and painfully obvious as sleep-deprived. He wondered for a moment, picturing the restless nights she must've had, and once again was conceited to think that perhaps she wished that it was his chest she had to lay her head on at night. Perhaps it was his warmth she longed for, that would cradle away the shadows and leave her at peace.

Almost instantly, the Doctor shook his head critically to himself. How dare he think like that. Her Rory. Her sweet, attentive Rory. Who better to have comfort her than him?

When he lifted his head, a quick wave of red bled through his cheek, and his eyes stung to blink away from the sight of her bare back as she slid her shirt up past her neck. Self-consciously, he glanced around the empty console room, and then allowed his eyes to drift back to the scanner, somewhat disappointed as the bold color of the dark bra first caught his attention. She stood in front of the wide mirror staring at the scars that wrapped around her pale, perfect torso, and gently smoothed her fingers across each one. Amy stopped her hand to the phantom wound that rested between her breasts, and her breath trembled violently as she inhaled.

He absentmindedly squinted to focus on each one that caught his attention, and his mind slapped him with an explanation for each scar, his curse sinking through his veins once more. The deep, white thrash that wrapped upward from her waist? Some sort of long blade, similar to a sword. The shallow, jagged slice that sat almost peacefully on her shoulder? Perhaps it was the first death strike that she narrowly avoided, the way he saw the blade lift above her bloodied flesh, and he sighed as his mind played it further than he wished. From the burn marks of torture, to the faintest ghosts of severe bludgeoning, to the bullet wounds that clung within six inches of her skin. He felt the boiling anger as his mind continued his recreation of each scar, and believed its smirk to spread wider with the encroaching fire that consumed each heart.

His mouth released some sort of spasm, as it always inadvertently did when emotions overran his calm mind, and he gripped the bar of the scanner, and watched more intently and anxiously.

With her eyes slowly lifting from the shade of her mangled hair, she stared in the reflection of her eyes, and watched as her right eyelid lightly twitched over its lifelessness. That's when his jaw finally fell and his lips grew numb, his eyes widened and yet contracted in a shivering anger.

Amy stared blankly at her reflection. Flooding now in acceptance, her left eye glanced to each scar that clung to her skin, while the other remained still, blanketed by the faint blue tint as it beheld only the throbbing darkness.


	3. Pacing Back and Forth

What his emotions strangled through to action in that moment was something the Doctor would later disregard from the lack of logic in which he did it. His mind had coddled him away from the explanation of her scars, yet the blindness of her eye couldn't be coyly talked over. She was attacked and it was obvious that she suffered so excruciatingly that she barely hung onto life, and that fact now bled as fast and thick as the rage that throbbed through his veins. She suffered.

He tightly clutched the levers where his hands lay, and his tongue slithered in and out and across his twitching lips. He was angry. And he fed into it. His mind would whisper in his ear, yet he shoved it away and stood in the fire he had the ability to extinguish. It didn't matter. His emotions already overtook everything and he already began working out the time and place, glancing to her as she sifted her limbs back through the shirt, squinting away at her quiet groans from the pain. Was it psychological, her limp? Perhaps. His mind whispered in an act to calm him down. But what if it wasn't?

With a firm shake of his head, he watched as his hair quickly settled still, staring at the brown ends of it as his green eyes drifted back up to the scanner.

She had already made her way back to her ugly chair, and the cherry oak longcase clock bellowed three times. Absentmindedly, she lifted up her wrist, and a faint, _faint _smile came to her face. She was smiling for that split second that always makes one internally, yet softly slap oneself. There was no watch on her wrist. And although normally he would've spewed booming words of, "Silly ol' Pond!", it only seemed to upset him more. This is what her days had become? Sequestered away in a quiet, dark house, reading a dull book, when just in the way she glanced outside of the window, she longed for the breeze on her skin. So alone and so suffocated with sadness that mistakenly thinking there was a watch on her wrist, _that's _what makes her faintly smile? How desperate was she….-No. He stopped his thoughts there. He wouldn't allow his mind to logically pick her brokenness apart when he knew that wouldn't help in any what way.

"It's my fault." He murmured to himself, oblivious to the TARDIS as it activated the voice interface behind him.

The Doctor slowly turned and winced at the sight of himself, standing there staring as apathetically back.

"With all due respect, Doctor." Said the interface flatly. "Eventually, everything is all your fault."

Immediately, he produced an ill-humored smile, and shrugged it off, turning back in a means to fiddle with the controls. "Thanks for the update."

The interface image of himself, seemingly shorted out, yet instantly reappeared closer next to him. "You walk across a dam, blissfully ignorant to it breaking, holding on to some sort of fleeting hope your acquired accessories grant you." It pauses until he glances to it. "But let us not lie. The moment their innocence is lost, so is your internal desire to keep them. You are a parasite that clings to youth and naivety, yet once you suck them dry, you discard the faint, withered versions of yourself, under the pretense that you have learned your lesson, convincing yourself that from then on you will play the martyr and spare anyone else the fire you spread with every touch."

As it spoke, the Doctor slowly turned his head away, and the voices quietly echo inside. The first was the young voice of Adric. _No. _He violently shook it away, and the monotonous voice of his interface returned.

"….only to throw yourself into a fit that flings you toward your next victim. You have become emotionally compromised with attempting to stop this inevitable cycle."

With an angered thrust, he jammed up a lever and its image scattered from sight. He stared at the reflective glass that wrapped around each intricate knob and doodad, and he closed his eyes and sighed as he heard the interface scattered back.

"However, if you ever cared anything for her, you will listen to my words, Doctor."

Its pause drew him to glance once more, and strangely, a faint smirk came upon its holographic face.

"Your failures and shortcomings have failed her time and time again. You stole her entire life from her and caused her great pain. Attempting any great measures will not only destroy what little is left of her, but inevitably poison the next innocent person you will encounter."

He brought his hand up to massage his hairless brow, "What exactly is it you want?"

"_Leave._"

The Doctor darted his head up to it, and held a somewhat surprised expression, "Run away, you want me to run away." Another spasm of his tongue, and he stared at the interface as the anger festered in his chest. "All I've ever done, really, is run away. All of this is the running away. I could run away, I could give up and dash away in my TARDIS. And no doubt you'll tell me that all the others wouldn't have gone the way they did if I just ran away, probably true in some perspectives. But what if I stopped the running away?"

"Impossible." It said quickly.

"But what if I stopped the thing that makes it impossible?"

"Doctor, you are allowing yourself to continue as emotionally compromi—"

He brought up an accusing finger to its static-y face, "But what if I did! Can you not humor me that?"

"Indefinitely?"

"No, temporarily, of course."

"How long?"

"Three, maybe four months?"

It paused a moment, and an expression bled on its face, a mixture of disappointment and disgust, "_Why_?"

"Think of it as a resting period." He anxiously placed his hands on his hips, tightening his mouth as he watched the interface slowly inch into consideration.

"Is it?"

He lightly nodded to himself, and a small smile spread across his face, "If it helps you hibernate."

It paused again, and seemingly sighed, "Tread carefully, Doctor."

He playfully tugged on his bowtie and smiled confidently as the interface scattered into nothing. There was a moment of silence, and its words stained in his head. But he glanced up to the scanner before he allowed the question to bleed further, and a gentle hold of comfort came upon him. The sight of his little Scottish girl, her eyelids lightly fluttering as she had slouched sleepily. In that chair, drifting into whatever dream that she would find. She was free. He smiled at how tiny she looked, how she looked like she had never grown up. As if he could only take a step in her path before she bolted for him, wrapping her arms around his neck and hugging him for dear life. He would hear her happiness say his name, and in the moment he closed his eyes to replay those times of him and his Pond, a part of him wondered if she was doing the same. If she still dreamed and longed for that same taste of paradise and freedom as he always did.

The Doctor shook his head to himself, to the interface that couldn't understand. They were hopeless. When the world told him to grow up, he ran from it and made his own ideas of what was proper. That was all it was with her. Partially, the crack in her wall. The big, empty house. Her, all alone. The girl who didn't make sense. It was only partially that. He saw in her something he had always wanted to see, and sometimes forced himself to see in others, but in her, he saw it for its entirety. Her eyes. Her wanting eyes. How he saw her in her eyes and how she quietly would pray with her entire soul, she _wanted_. She wanted the moon, so he gave a child a suitcase of sweets. She wanted everything, and he may have crossed his fingers behind his back, but he gave her the taste of that. He needed to give her that taste because he knew he needed someone to run with. He needed someone to squeeze his hand so tightly as they both just ran. The world of suffocating rules and demanding logic. The girl who didn't make sense and wouldn't accept their 'sense'. Who better to run with?

He missed her. _God, _how much he missed her. With an anxious sigh, he combed his fingers through his hair, and glanced back up to the scanner. She was still slouching in the chair, he could feel _that _Doctor lightly laugh at how much of a child she looked like. A little girl who had fallen asleep while reading in her father's chair.

With the thought flicking upside his head, he began to turn a few several knobs, almost cheerfully pressing a couple dozen buttons along the console. He slipped his hand under it, and paused for a moment in thought.

"_Just a few months," _he told _that_ Doctor, "_just a few months, until I sort things out."_

As he gripped the lever, and inhaled a breath, his eyes drifted to Amy for courage, and in that second of hesitance, the words played in his head.

_I can be brave for you_

He felt the motion travel up his arm, his eyes remaining on her, and right as it burned into his palm, she startled from the chair and scrambled up out of it as the front door unlatched, and he paused. Amy frantically dashed down the hallway, which much pain, and she slipped out of the scanner's view. He released the lever as he went to trail her, yet stopped at the figure stomping through the front door. Rory Williams walked slowly into the house, and as he stepped into view, the Doctor arched an eyebrow in confusion. His hair seemed longer, and messy, and a thick, grizzly beard covered the majority of his face. He wore an agitated expression, and yet all so vacant.

Rory carefully shut the door, though quite loud regardless, and he dragged his feet down the hallway to the open door of their bedroom. He paused, looked at Amy, who had been pretending to be asleep with her back to the doorway, and he reached for the doorknob and slowly pulled the creaking door shut. Yet before it rattled closed, there was a quiet knock at the front door.

Her heart leapt into her mouth at the thought, her eyes shot open as they darted anxiously for the ears to listen more intently. The sound of Rory dragging his feet down the hallway. His quiet growl as he cleared his throat. The doorknob squeaked as his hand turned it. And her eyes squeezed shut with her held breath.

If she had all the guesses in the world, she would still only say it was him. _"Rory the Roman!_" His voice (his sweet, sweet voice that she replayed an extra time just to soothe herself) would beam with that smile. He would be on that other side of the door, talking in that same, happy voice, with that same bright smile, and he would hug like he only has one friend and it's you.

Amy's eyes slowly opened as Rory's voice carried through the silence, as apathetic as ever, yet only a faint mutter of another. The door creaked shut and his stomping found its way further from her hearing. She quietly sighed. There was a part of her mind that wished it would have been him.

Regret filled up her head as she replayed the moments, his attentive voice, why couldn't she just have gave in and let him hold her for a few minutes? _No_. The scars sternly whispered.

A rustling sound pulled her out of her thoughts. Rory had carelessly tossed something on the kitchen counter. Is that what it was? Some package delivery? That's all? She grumbled to herself, pushing her face deeper into the bed. She didn't miss him. She would never miss her imaginary friend. What was it he said? _It's time to stop waiting_. But how could she ever stop? Another quiet grumble and sting of pain spread up her back.

The TARDIS door creaked open and shut, and he leapt up the stairs as he began to peel off the prosthetic beard that he messily stuck to his face. He gripped one side of it, somewhat fascinated and excited to experience that saying of, "_Rip it off quick like a band-aid_", and he inhaled, tearing it off.

He silently screamed at the pain, and it seemed to grow in confidence from his reaction, though he petered into a faint whimper and stared frantically as it stuck to his hand. Viciously trying to shake it off, he convulsed his entire arm until slamming the hand against one of the console's handlebars.

For a quick moment, he released a relieved sigh that the horror has ended, yet his hands ran up and slapped into his cheeks and he rubbed them to check if he still had skin. He sighed again, and pulled off the blond wig, tossing it onto one of the chairs.

As he walked around the console, he reached and retrieved his sonic screwdriver. He lifted it over his head, and swept it down his body, the distorted whirring grew loud and then silent, and he stood there smiling as he tugged on his bowtie.

"Missed you." He said quietly, and the smile slowly faded from his face.

His eyes hesitantly drifted back up the scanner. Rory sat frozen on the small couch as the television quietly buzzed. The Doctor noticed that the large, yellow chair had been shoved into one of the corners, and as the papers lay scattered and crumpled around it, he knew.

Something strange boiled in his chest, and he clutched the thought to keep it burning. The look on Rory's patronizing face when he stared at it with his own eyes. Did he do this? Did he hurt . . . .

Another spasm and his tongue smoothed across his lips, they tightened into a fuming smile, and he stared up at Rory as he sat so unemotional.

Before the interface could scatter back and intervene, the Doctor leapt down the stairs, strode outside the TARDIS, stomped up the stairs that led up to their house and brought his fist up to knock as hard as he could and it would still be construed as unintentional. But as he watched his hand ball and drift in front of the wood, he paused. Suddenly, _that _Doctor left, and he quietly knocked against the door.

Amy swallowed anxiously as the dragging feet crossed down the hallway and stopped. She closed her eyes tightly, and listened. The door creaked open, and a confused expression swept over Rory's face. On the doorstep sat another small package.

His panting slowly stopped as he stood on the other side of the TARDIS doors, and she buried her face back into the blankets as the door swung shut.


End file.
